Re: Guide to Installing and Running MiniDLNA on an Ubuntu Server

I checked the permissions on the folders and they open but to double check I ran

Code:

sudo 777 /media/Storage/tvshows

I presume that you mean 'sudo chmod 777'.

Are you running miniDLNA manually? You are getting permission problems which suggests that this is the case.

MiniDLNA is designed to be run as a daemon (like, for example, the Apache web server), which means that it is usually run with escalated permissions by a startup script.
Running it as a manual process is more of a debug usage, as running any server manually is.

In your case the database is causing an error, as is adding an inotify watch (not reading the folders). The DB is not generally stored in the media location, but it seems to default on the Ubuntu package to /var/lib/minidlna/files.db (or it could be /var/cache/minidlna/files.db as this is the config file suggestion).

Can you see if the database file exists and what the permissions are on the file?

The start-up script forces the user to minidlna, and that is the owner and group on my file.

If you want to run manually or without the escalated permissions required to write to the standard locations, you will have to configure the db to a writeable directory either in your config file, or as a command line parameter.

HTH,
Craig

Last edited by craigchambers; December 5th, 2012 at 10:22 AM.
Reason: Understood the issue better

Re: Guide to Installing and Running MiniDLNA on an Ubuntu Server

Hi all, maybe someone of you can help me out.

I've installed minidlna and was using it without any issues until a couple of days ago.
Everything seems to work fine except two things:
1) if I want to watch a video that has subtitles inserted directly in the file (not as separate file), the subtitles don't show at all in the TV. Because of this problem I ran it manually and I found that I get an error, which takes me to the next point
2) I get a parsing error in line 1, which is the port. I didn't touch anything here and it's all default. However I don't know what the problem could be or how to check it.

I'm running Minidlna version 1.0.25

The only thing that I installed a couple of days ago was Webmin and the minidlna module.

Re: Guide to Installing and Running MiniDLNA on an Ubuntu Server

I've installed minidlna and was using it without any issues until a couple of days ago.
1) Embedded subtitles don't show at all in the TV.

Is this a new problem since you upgraded? Subtitle support is generally client side. My Sonys don't support them at all (embedded or in an SRT file).

2) I ran it manually and I get a parsing error in line 1, which is the port.

Did you stop the existing minidlna daemon?

The only thing that I installed a couple of days ago was Webmin and the minidlna module.

I found webmin a lot more trouble than it was worth in time saving (YMMV). Did the minidlna module also pull in a repository version of minidlna that up/downgraded your existing install?
Did it overwrite your existing config file. Did it change the init script?